This invention relates to a material spreader and more particularly to an elongated spreader hopper adapted to be mounted at the rear of a hopper truck to receive particulate material therefrom and spread it on a surface evenly throughout the width of the truck.
For many years now in northern climates where spreading of sand, salt, and the like on highways is a common winter time occurrence, specialized hopper trucks have been developed. These trucks have a large sloped hopper for receiving the sand/salt and a conveyor, usually a belt type, in the bottom of the hopper for conveying the sand/salt to the back of the truck where it is discharged onto a rotating disc which throws the sand/salt across the width of the road as the truck is driven down the road.
Because of the rather specialized nature of these hopper trucks and their particular construction characteristics they have been a single purpose machine and have had to sit idle for the better part of the year, when not employed in their primary function of spreading sand and salt.
In the better weather parts of the year, road building activities particularly resurfacing activities, require the spreading of gravel in an even and controlled manner along the road surface. These large specialized hopper trucks have the ability to deliver large quantities of gravel but the conventional rotating disc hopper has proven very unsatisfactory for the even controlled distribution of material as required in road building.